Plantago gentianoides subsp. gentianoides Illustration Credit: M.Y. Saleem

Perennial stemless herb with vertical to horizontal thick roots, small to 30 (-50) cm tall. Leaves up to 10 in rosettes, decumbent, membranous, ovate-lanceolate to broad ovate, apices usually obtuse to obtusely apiculate, base roundish to attenuated, margin entire to undulate to remotely denticulate, glabrous to rarely covered with adpressed white hair. Scapes ascendent, (3-) 20 cm long, glabrous to villous in the upper parts. Spike capituliform, 0.5 cm diameter, to narrow cylindrical, up to 15 (-25) cm long. Sepals 2 mm long, anterior ones oval to obovate-oval, posterior sepals elliptic to broad-elliptic, apices incised, glabrous to minutely ciliate above, middle ones narrower. Corolla lobes 1.25-1.5 mm long, sub-ovate to ovate, obtuse to roundish elliptic. Capsules ellipsoid to conically attenuated above. Seeds 2-4, rarely 7-8, irregularly oval, reddish brown, punctate, 2-2.5 mm long.

Distribution of species: South-east Europe, Iran, Afghanistan, Western Himalayan mountains to Tibet.